One Liberal's First Gun Show...

[liberalmuse]

...and last. I just spent the past two hours of my life amongst the dregs of humanity. I didn't think it would be this bad. I was in the Army, after all. I can shoot, take apart, clean and put an M16 or a 50 caliber back together again. However, as soon as I walked in the room, the sight of so many guns made me sick to my stomach. I passed under a banner that told me I was a true Patriot and all of my rights were guaranteed with the 2nd Amendment. Go'on!? You don't need a brain or an education on civil liberties or The Constitution, just a gun.

Like many liberals these days, I've been thinking it might be wise to purchase a gun, though now I realize I wasn't really serious. The gun nuts will just have to shoot me in the event there is some kind of civil war/revolution because I will not own the cowardly piece of shit, phallic extension that is 'the gun'.

Most enlightening were the numerous displays of real Nazi memorabilia. WTF??? That was pretty creepy. There was also a surprising lack of testosterone and cheer in the room as milquetoast men and sallow-eyed women were pensively examining the wares. I'm sure I'm being very biased and over-the-top, but it was fucking unreal seen through my perspective. I found the entire affair sickening, disturbing and almost comical.

Then I saw the bumpersticker rack. 'Ted Kennedy's car has killed more people than my gun'. 'I didn't claw my way up the food chain to eat vegetables'. No, just McDonalds and junk food manufactured by Frito-Lay, you fat f*ck. Oh, but you have a gun (said with the proper reverance). The rack was littered with many more dumbf*ck statements about how to eat cats and such. Christ they were mindless. I especially liked the 'circle/slash over the ACLU' t-shirt. Contrary to misguded liberal belief, the ACLU isn't a defender of The Constitution. Apparently, without the NRA and the guns it pimps out, we 'murkans would have no rights atall.

Anyway, it just wasn't my thing. After walking around for a bit and admiring some stained glass work, jewlery and purposely avoiding the massive array of guns, I ended up merely observing with my friend's mom as we drank a beer and talked about things you don't want overheard by gun show attendees. We watched men in fatigues, backwards baseball caps, shaved heads and a couple w/cowboy hats and humungous beer bellies hanging over chaps. There were no lack of stereotypes if you were looking for them. We commented on a couple of men holding their babies and agreed we found it attractive. There also was the disturbing site of little kids lugging rifles around.

I'm ashamed to say I did buy a lovely albeit cheaply made 16" dagger w/a jewel-encrusted horses head hilt for my daughter as we were leaving. She likes guns, knives and Nader just to spite me, though I have to admit I did like many of the swords. All in all, an interesting but decidedly unpleasant experience. Oh yeah, as we were leaving, I had to stop myself from flipping off the occupants of a van w/a bumpersticker that read, 'Because Dr. Laura Says So' or some such nonsense. Fate was kind, because I saw absolutely no references to Bush.

[mhr]

1. I Understand Your Revulsion Of The Gun Counterculture

Nevertheless, your military training may come in handy sooner than anyone of us would like.

If I had the skills, I would start a para-military training program just for liberals and progressives.

I would also loudly market the program to put the fear of their God in their own heads.

These people seem to think that all liberals and progressives are passive types. Nothing could be farther from the truth.

Like others, I know that I am being screwed by the likes of these gun show denizens and their political leaders.

One day there will be hell to pay.

[Liberal Veteran]

7. The righties do think that too...I got into an argument with one once.

I told him I am about as liberal as they come and I am armed and have been for all my life and not only do I own a gun, I damn sure know how to use it and wouldn't hesitate to.

He was like: "Well, you must be the exception because I haven't seen any liberals at the NRA rallies I go to. If so many liberals own guns then how come they aren't in the NRA?"

I laughed at him and said that maybe if the NRA wasn't hijacked by a bunch of right wing nutjobs who bash liberals all the time and spread false rumors about liberals wanting to take away their guns, they might actually attract a couple of liberals. As it is, I don't have to join the NRA to believe I have a right to own a gun. In fact, I know just as many liberals that own guns as right wingers.

He didn't know what to say to that.

So I drove home the point that the there are well over 80 million people in the US who own guns and only 5 million NRA members in America. Which means around 6 percent of gun owners are part of the NRA, so trying to make any kind of assumptions about gun owners based on the whack jobs in the NRA is ridiculous. Not only do most people on the left have no use for the NRA because of it's bias and tunnel vision, but most of us have no need to parade around the fact that we are armed.

[Catch22Dem]

2. I believe there's a gun show here this weekend

I don't want ANYTHING to do with it. Oddly enough, I was also in the military. HAHAHA.

[Rick Myers]

3. Excellent post

I've always wanted to go to a gun show, but never had the stomach for it. I do own a Walther PPK, but it's not been fired in about 10 years.

My short story: I was at a flea market with Janet several weeks ago, and came across a 'gunshow' type with the stickers and such... I picked up two stickers, "I see dumb people" and "If you touch my bike, I'll f*#k your dog." Ironically, I want the bike sticker to put on my Cannondale mountain bike. So the guy says, 'oh, you own a bike,' (apparently he thinks all bikers are racists) and pulls a brochure out of his pocket. "Here, I sell these for 50 cents." The cover says "Ni&&er Owner's Manual." I about died. I handed it back and said, "that's just wrong."

What I should have done was bought it, walked over the the biggest black guy around and showed him what I'd just recieved from the pasty little honkie!!!

The world is FULL of idiots!!!

[Cats Against Frist]

4. What you need is a "left-wing gun narrative"

Don't let the right-wing steal this from you, too. They don't own the concept of "weaponry," even though they definitely have a sickening counterculture that goes along with it.

There are lots of reasons a liberal can and should own a gun -- but I agree with you that the normal gun shows are populated with people who'll wax sentimental over Ruby Ridge, but roll over like little wussoids for the Patriot Act. They're just barely human.

[Placebo]

5. Mmmm...phallic extension...

*drools*

[Swamp Rat]

6. This might be Dr. Laura's son - Deryk Schlessinger:

[billbuckhead]

14. Strange but true--Deryk Schlessinger has a hookah shop in Hillsdale, MI

Ex-student set to open hookah bar in Hillsdale


By Dave Frank
Collegian Reporter


The first experience most students probably had with a hookah was watching the caterpillar swarthily blow smoke vowels from one in Disney's Alice in Wonderland.


Former student Deryk Schlessinger will try to make that experience a bit more personal by opening Hillsdale's first hookah bar. The bar is scheduled to open soon after Spring Break in downtown Hillsdale near the old Democratic Party offices.


"We're trying to bring the Middle Eastern culture to Hillsdale," Schlessinger said, from an easy chair beside a 5-foot gold-plated hookah in his Park Place apartment. "Even though that sounds like a big task, we think we can do it through hookahs, a couple tapestries and a fountain."

--------------snip-----------------------

<http://www.hillsdale.edu/collegian/127_20/news/hookah.htm>

[kodi]

8. hope you washed down the gun show with a monster truck rally!

if you want to freak out your foreign friends, take them to an american gun show.

i did years ago with a french buddy. he was scared to death as we walked around with folks carrying pistols and rifles everwhere. i told him that with 5,000 visitors to the show, i bet that at least 0.01% had killed someone and got away with it... leaving 5 killers walking around the show....then i took him to the state fair where they had pig races, not thoroughbreds mind you, these were quarter-pigs that raced.

it takes a lot to impress a post doc in physics from grenoble

[Zomby Woof]

9. reminds me of the bumpersticker I saw today

"My Guns Protect Your Freedom".

Bullshit. No stupid redneck POS with a penis extension in his holster is protecting MY freedom, that jagoff.

I am upping my ACLU contribution NOW.

Thanks for the report. Sounds like a Flea Market from Hell. :-)

[PragMantisT]

10. Gun shows are like Grateful Dead shows...

there's nothing like them.

I was reluctant prior to my first experience but found it hilarious and now go regularly. It's a good way to see what is going on in the enemy camp. It used to be the only place to get a copy of "The Turner Diaries". I bought my copy from Timothy McVeigh (before he was famous, I swear) at a show at the Little Rock Fairgrounds. There's one there tomorrow.

In addition to guns, there is some cool stuff at gun shows. It is the only place to acquire a switchblade, which for some reason I have no 2nd amendment right to (thanks NRA, defending my second amendment rights, my ass). They also have useful stuff like lockpick sets and hemostats and folding scissors and tweezers. Usually there's a coin vendor.

If you can look past the other people there, gun shows can be great sources for hard to find items. Of course, the people at the shows are the real reason to go. I mean what kind of person travels around selling AK-47s or .50 caliber slugs by the pound.

So attend your local gun show; after all hunting and voting seasons are approaching. Don't get them mixed up.

[rockymountaindem]

11. That Nazi stuff is sick, I know.

I collect memorabilia, and I go to gun shows to get some of it (good deals can be found there). I collect medals, mostly, and I've got about 40 medals from around the world (not bad for someone who's only 17).

But man, those Nazi things are as thick as flies. Top dollar for anything with a swastika on it. It makes me really creeped out because I'm Jewish. People buy old copies of Mein Kampf in German, old SS daggers with the "My Honor is Loyalty" motto carved in the blade, Eagle and Swastika insignia, SS insignia, boots, Walther P38s with Nazi insignia carved in them, it's absolutely sickening. Oh, not to mention the flags...

These are the people who would call me "unpatriotic" and an "America hater" for being a liberal, but hey, they're the ones who'll spend money for anything with a Swastika on it. Talk about hypocrisy.

I go to the University of Toronto, and I visited a Canadian surplus store looking for a fur hat. They had an old Soviet one there with the Red star and hammer and sickle on it, and I mentioned that I'd get my ass kicked with that thing in Colorado. He said they sell a lot of them in October and November before it gets cold. I told him about the Nazi fetish lots of collectors have in the States, and he shook his head in disgust and said "You wear anything with a Swastika over in Bathurst (the Jewish district) and you'll get your ass kicked fer sure!" That made me smile.

[TlalocW]

12. Question about gun shows

Although totally unrelated to anything political - just popped into my head when I read about the knife.

I've never been to a gun show so I wouldn't know. Would there be dealers there selling battle-axes with blades on both sides of the handle - maybe about 3 feet long? I've been looking for some for a while.

TlalocW

[sendero]

13. I don't care much...

... for the "gun counterculture", but I still think everyone should own guns. If guns are for fascists, only fascists will have guns. :)